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Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
Driskill Graduate Program in Life Sciences

Recent Student Publications

Listed here is a selection of recent publications by current students.

  1. Ball HE, Woods AC, Wong YC  TDP-43 oxidation and PP1 crosstalk at RNA granule-mitochondria contact sites.  Nat Commun  2026 Jun 05;. doi:10.1038/s41467-026-74009-9
  2. Ferrari ÁJR, Dixit SM, Thibeault J, Garcia M, Houliston S, Ludwig RW, Notin P, Phoumyvong CM, Martell CM, Jung MD  et al.  Large-scale discovery, analysis and design of protein energy landscapes.  Nature  2026 May 13;. doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10465-z
  3. Barajas A, Mayoral J, Cianciotto NP  Major type IV pilin of Legionella pneumophila enhances bacterial iron acquisition/assimilation, independently of its role in piliation.  mBio  2026 May 13;17(5):e0059626. pii:e00596-26
  4. Everett BA, Prindle A  AexB is an aromatic amino acid exporter that functions as a metabolic safety valve.  mBio  2026 May 13;17(5):e0023126. pii:e00231-26
  5. Fisher NP, Kanchustambham VL, Tsui EL, Lock C, Xu T, McDowell HB, Pla I, Saunders DC, Kafader JO, Laronda MM  et al.  Probing Proteoform Heterogeneity From Single Human Oocytes.  Mol Cell Proteomics  2026 May;25(5):101566. pii:101566
  6. Xiao S, Kopbayashi M, Bai Y, Cai W, Barajas S, Amin MA, Vemula S, Yao C, Yang Y, Borchers C  et al.  PTP4A2 Promotes Leukemogenesis through Inhibiting the p53 Tumor Suppressor Signaling Pathway in Leukemia-initiating Cells.  Blood Adv  2026 Apr 15;. pii:bloodadvances.2025018908
  7. Billingham LK, DeLay SL, Eshac Y, Chia TY, Tripathi S, Olson IE, Zilinger K, Subbiah J, Wang Z, Sadagopan NS  et al.  Microglial fructose metabolism is essential for glioblastoma growth.  Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A  2026 Mar 24;123(12):e2521256123. pii:e2521256123
  8. Haupt B, Turunen J, Olson I, Ahmed AU, Balyasnikova IV  Transcranial cisternal port enables repetitive intrathecal delivery in mice.  Sci Rep  2026 Mar 10;16(1). pii:12905
  9. Hepler C, Waldeck NJ, Weidemann BJ, Marcheva B, Chen YJ, Hecker J, Zhu Z, Nozawa R, Mastroni JV, Thorne AK  et al.  Adipocyte NADH dehydrogenase reverses circadian and diet-induced metabolic syndrome.  Nat Metab  2026 Mar;8(3):559-571. doi:10.1038/s42255-026-01464-5
  10. Bodner J, Vadlamani P, Lee AS, Helmin KA, Liu Q, Pratasenia AE, Horst MMA, Ravisankar S, Khurana S, Mendillo ML  et al.  Human CRAMP1 specifically promotes the expression of histone H1 genes.  EMBO Rep  2026 Mar;27(5):1122-1145. doi:10.1038/s44319-026-00704-9
  11. Sun L, Tang A, Liao J, Yang GY  Distinct Single-Cell Expression Pattern of the Soluble Epoxide Hydrolase and Cytochrome p450 Epoxygenases in Human and Mouse Small Intestinal Epithelia.  J Histochem Cytochem  2026;74(2):163-179. pii:00221554251403631
  12. Chen S, Barajas S, Vemula S, Yang Y, Simpson E, Gao H, Li R, Behzadnia F, Nabinger SC, Schmitz DA  et al.  Mutant p53 promotes clonal hematopoiesis by generating a chronic inflammatory microenvironment.  J Clin Invest  2026 Feb 02;136(3). pii:e184285
  13. Davis BT, Han H, Islam MBAR, Ford K, Chen Z, Abdala-Valencia H, Green S, Weiss C, Procissi D, Schwulst SJ  Short-Chain Fatty Acid Supplementation After Traumatic Brain Injury Attenuates Neurologic Injury Via the Gut-Brain-Microglia Axis.  Shock  2026 Feb 01;65(2):329-341. doi:10.1097/SHK.0000000000002706
  14. Lazzarotto CR, Katta V, Li Y, Manquen G, Wood RK, Chyr J, Urbina E, Matsubara A, Lee G, Wu X  et al.  Sensitive and unbiased genome-wide profiling of base-editor-induced off-target activity using CHANGE-seq-BE.  Nat Biotechnol  2026 Jan 02;. doi:10.1038/s41587-025-02948-7
  15. Liu K, Iyer R, Li Y, Zhu J, Cai Z, Wei J, Cheng Y, Tang AY, Wang H, Gao Q  et al.  USP22 drives tumor immune evasion and checkpoint blockade resistance through EZH2-mediated epigenetic silencing of MHC-I.  J Clin Invest  2026 Jan 02;136(1). pii:e193162
  16. Gomez-Maqueo X, Rylaarsdam LE, Woo A, Schroder AL, Rakotomamonjy J, Bossert CL, Smith TA, Ruiz S, Gilardi J, Klei L  et al.  PACS1 syndrome variant alters proteomic landscape of developing cortical organoids.  bioRxiv  2025 Dec 27;. pii:2025.04.23.650290
  17. Olson IE, Chojak R, Faisal UH, Turunen J, Lazanyi I, Miska J, Ahmed AU  Use of Cerebral Open-Flow Microperfusion for the Longitudinal Collection of Interstitial Fluid in an Animal Model of Glioblastoma.  J Vis Exp  2025 Dec 23;(226). doi:10.3791/68748
  18. Beauchamp EM, Jain A, Clutter M, Nahotko D, Lopez Fajardo E, Vagadia PP, Dunne SF, Mina A, Fischietti M, Oku CV  et al.  Development of a SIN1 targeting inhibitor as a novel therapeutic approach for the treatment of malignancies.  Mol Cancer Ther  2025 Dec 22;. doi:10.1158/1535-7163.MCT-25-0298
  19. Haupt BE, Turunen J, Olson I, Ahmed AU, Balyasnikova IV  The Transcranial Cisternal Port (TCP): A Novel Technique for Repetitive Intrathecal Delivery in Mice.  Res Sq  2025 Dec 01;. pii:rs.3.rs-8080141
  20. Nengroo MA, Klein AT, Carr HS, Vidal-Cruchez O, Sahu U, McGrail DJ, Sahni N, Thompson NB, Faull PA, Gao P  et al.  Accumulation of succinate suppresses de novo purine synthesis through succinylation-mediated control of the mitochondrial folate cycle.  Mol Cell  2025 Nov 20;85(22):4215-4228.e9. doi:10.1016/j.molcel.2025.10.002
  21. Martell CM, Gebis KK, Van HM, Gutierrez YM, Jung MD, Savas JN, Rocklin GJ  Global Analysis of Aggregation Determinants in Small Protein Domains.  bioRxiv  2025 Nov 12;. pii:2025.11.11.687847
  22. Carpio Gonzalez D, Glasco AD, Woloschak GE, Dewji SA  Reconstructing strontium-90 intake in beagles using neural networks: a data-driven assessment of historical inhalation records.  J Radiol Prot  2025 Nov 06;45(4). pii:041512
  23. Yu R, Kim S, Li S, Yang W, Kim G, Lu LF, Cong Y, Kim D, Min B  Intronic miR-342 is a key regulator of cellular glycolysis in Foxp3+ regulatory CD4 T cells.  J Immunol  2025 Nov 01;214(11):2976-2986. doi:10.1093/jimmun/vkaf181
  24. Campo H, Hashim PH, Zaniker-Gomez EJ, Gauthier S, Yan Z, Zhang HF, Ankrum JA, Duncan FE  Production and Use of Customizable Agarose Molds for Scaffold-Free Mouse Ovarian Follicle Culture.  J Vis Exp  2025 Oct 24;(224). doi:10.3791/68871
  25. Hepler C, Waldeck NJ, Weidemann BJ, Marcheva B, Chen YJ, Hecker J, Zhu Z, Nozawa R, Mastroni JV, Thorne AK  et al.  NADH dehydrogenase reverses dietary and clock metabolic syndrome.  bioRxiv  2025 Oct 23;. pii:2025.10.22.684030
  26. Almubarak HF, Tan W, Hoffmann AD, Sun Y, Wei J, El-Shennawy L, Squires JR, Dashzeveg NK, Simonton B, Jia Y  et al.  Integrated antibody language model accelerates IgG screening and design for broad-spectrum antiviral therapy.  iScience  2025 Oct 17;28(10):113584. pii:113584
  27. Alicea Pauneto CDM, Riesenberg BP, Gandy EJ, Kennedy AS, Clutton GT, Hem JW, Hurst KE, Hunt EG, Green JM, Miller BC  et al.  Intra-tumoral hypoxia promotes CD8+ T cell dysfunction via chronic activation of integrated stress response transcription factor ATF4.  Immunity  2025 Oct 14;58(10):2489-2504.e8. doi:10.1016/j.immuni.2025.09.003
  28. Fazal A, Harker EJ, Neelam V, Olson SM, Rolfes MA, Reinhart K, Kniss K, Frutos A, Leonard J, Reed C  et al.  Pediatric Influenza-Associated Encephalopathy and Acute Necrotizing Encephalopathy - United States, 2024-25 Influenza Season.  MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep  2025 Sep 25;74(36):556-564. doi:10.15585/mmwr.mm7436a1
  29. Liang Z, Maddineni A, Ortega JA, Magdongon CB, Jambardi S, Roy S, Tycko J, Patil A, Manzano M, Bartom ET  et al.  Cytotoxicity of activator expression in CRISPR-based transcriptional activation systems.  Nat Commun  2025 Aug 29;16(1):8071. pii:8071
  30. Hoffmann AD, Almubarak HF, Iyer R, Weinberg SE, Squires JR, Mao C, Wei J, Chaudhuri S, El-Shennawy L, Dashzeveg NK  et al.  Identification of immune signatures associated with both SARS-CoV-2 infection and lung transplantation.  Cell Rep Med  2025 Aug 19;6(8):102262. pii:102262
  31. Bauer R, Parker C, Cardona Matos Z, Hayes MG, Kunselman AR, Legro RS, Welt CK, Urbanek M  Pathogenic variation in insulin resistance genes is common in polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS): a strategy for causal gene discovery using whole-exome sequencing (WES) in complex traits.  medRxiv  2025 Aug 15;. pii:2025.08.13.25333592
  32. Popowitch EB, Boiditswe SC, Patel MZ, Aquino JN, Hurst JH, Steenhoff AP, Cunningham AL, Yoon JW, Seed PC, Kelly MS  Corynebacterium rhinophilum sp. nov. isolated from the human upper respiratory tract.  Int J Syst Evol Microbiol  2025 Jul;75(7). doi:10.1099/ijsem.0.006835
  33. Cunningham AL, Zhbannikov IY, Myers R, Tran TH, Gao W, Lemon KP, Aquino JN, Hurst JH, Yoon JW, Seed PC  et al.  Genome mining identifies a diversity of natural product biosynthetic capacity in human respiratory Corynebacterium strains.  mSphere  2025 Jun 25;10(6):e0025825. pii:e00258-25
  34. Ranava D, Lander SM, Kuan SY, Winkelman JD, Prindle A, Yap MF  A promiscuous Bcd amino acid dehydrogenase promotes biofilm development in Bacillus subtilis.  NPJ Biofilms Microbiomes  2025 Jun 21;11(1):112. pii:112
  35. Bauer R, Parker C, Gorsic LK, Hayes MG, Kunselman AR, Legro RS, Welt CK, Urbanek M  Rare Variation in LMNA Underlies Polycystic Ovary Syndrome Pathogenesis in 2 Independent Cohorts.  J Clin Endocrinol Metab  2025 Jun 17;110(7):e2217-e2232. doi:10.1210/clinem/dgae761
  36. Li Y, Ding Y, Dennis S, Hutch MR, Zhou J, Zhou Y, Li Y, Pillai M, Ghotbaldini S, Garcia MA  et al.  SOAR elucidates biological insights and empowers drug discovery through spatial transcriptomics.  Sci Adv  2025 Jun 13;11(24):eadt7450. pii:eadt7450
  37. Wang H, Hu D, Cheng Y, Gao Q, Liu K, Mani NL, Tang AY, Iyer R, Gao B, Sun L  et al.  Succinate drives gut inflammation by promoting FOXP3 degradation through a molecular switch.  Nat Immunol  2025 Jun;26(6):866-880. doi:10.1038/s41590-025-02166-y
  38. Wang J, Fu C, Chang S, Stephens C, Li H, Wang D, Fu YC, Green KJ, Yan J, Yi R  PIEZO1-mediated calcium signaling reinforces mechanical properties of hair follicle stem cells to promote quiescence.  Sci Adv  2025 May 30;11(22):eadt2771. pii:eadt2771
  39. Schroder AL, Songster LD, Savich Y, Titus MA  Filopodia numbers impact chemotactic migration speed.  bioRxiv  2025 May 29;. pii:2025.05.28.656686
  40. Chaikin CA, Thakkar AV, Steffeck AWT, Pfrender EM, Hung K, Zhu P, Waldeck NJ, Nozawa R, Song W, Futtner CR  et al.  Control of circadian muscle glucose metabolism through the BMAL1-HIF axis in obesity.  Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A  2025 Apr;122(13):e2424046122. pii:e2424046122
  41. Ferrari ÁJR, Dixit SM, Thibeault J, Garcia M, Houliston S, Ludwig RW, Notin P, Phoumyvong CM, Martell CM, Jung MD  et al.  Large-scale discovery, analysis, and design of protein energy landscapes.  bioRxiv  2025 Mar 25;. pii:2025.03.20.644235
  42. McKinsey GL, Santander N, Zhang X, Kleemann KL, Tran L, Katewa A, Conant K, Barraza M, Waddell K, Lizama CO  et al.  Radial glia integrin avb8 regulates cell autonomous microglial TGFβ1 signaling that is necessary for microglial identity.  Nat Commun  2025 Mar 22;16(1):2840. pii:2840
  43. McDowell H, Vieco-Martí I, VanZanten M, Pant S, Kubo H, Saunders DC, Laronda MM, Granados-Aparici S  Digital analysis of ovarian tissue: generating a standardized method of follicle analysis†.  Biol Reprod  2025 Mar 16;112(3):416-419. doi:10.1093/biolre/ioaf022
  44. Nengroo MA, Klein AT, Carr HS, Vidal-Cruchez O, Sahu U, McGrail DJ, Sahni N, Gao P, Asara JM, Shah H  et al.  Succinate dehydrogenase activity supports de novo purine synthesis.  bioRxiv  2025 Mar 01;. pii:2025.02.26.640389
  45. Cai W, Liu X, Barajas S, Xiao S, Vemula S, Chen H, Yang Y, Bochers C, Henley D, Liu S  et al.  Polycomb group protein Mel18 inhibits hematopoietic stem cell self-renewal through repressing the transcription of self-renewal and proliferation genes.  Leukemia  2025 Feb;39(2):296-307. doi:10.1038/s41375-024-02462-w
  46. Carver K, Clark C, Zhong Y, Yang G, Mishra M, Alarcon C, Perera M  MeQTL Mapping in African American Hepatocytes Reveals Shared Genetic Regulators of DNA Methylation and Gene Expression.  bioRxiv  2025 Jan 26;. pii:2025.01.23.634506
  47. Goncharoff D, Du Z, Venkatesan S, Cho B, Zhao J, Alasady MJ, Huey D, Ma H, Rosenthal J, Turenitsa A  et al.  Investigating the Aggregation and Prionogenic Properties of Human Cancer-Related Proteins.  Mol Cell Biol  2025;45(4):154-168. doi:10.1080/10985549.2025.2481054
  48. Ma R, Prigge AD, Ortiz Serrano TP, Cheng Y, Davis JM, Lou KF, Wood WA, Do HC, Ren Z, Fulcer MM  et al.  Vimentin modulates regulatory T cell receptor-ligand interactions at distal pole complex, leading to dysregulated host response to viral pneumonia.  Cell Rep  2024 Dec 24;43(12):115056. doi:10.1016/j.celrep.2024.115056
  49. Ortega JA, Liang Z, Xu JK, Gottwein E  Retargeting target-directed microRNA-decay sites to highly expressed viral or cellular miRNAs.  Nucleic Acids Res  2024 Dec 11;52(22):14171-14183. doi:10.1093/nar/gkae1103
  50. Willis AB, Zelikovich AS, Sufit R, Ajroud-Driss S, Vandenborne K, Demonbreun AR, Batra A, Walter GA, McNally EM  Serum protein and imaging biomarkers after intermittent steroid treatment in muscular dystrophy.  Sci Rep  2024 Nov 20;14(1):28745. pii:28745

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